


I Do Love You So

by Kaidan



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M, Love Potion/Spell, M/M, Slow Burn, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-10
Updated: 2013-03-10
Packaged: 2017-12-04 20:43:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/714893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaidan/pseuds/Kaidan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lydia was eight and wanted Stiles' attention. Now she's sixteen and wishes she hadn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Do Love You So

**Author's Note:**

> I really shouldn't be starting another story when I should be focusing on ROOT, but I couldn't keep my hands off if I tried. [Here's the prompt](http://tnw-kinkmeme.livejournal.com/2665.html?thread=137833#t137833)
> 
> The suicide attempt will not happen for some time, though I will of course tack a warning on the chapter when it does.

Lydia Martin is eight years old, and has never had a lack of attention that she demanded of her peers and parents. She is eight years old, petite and pretty, and Stiles Stilinski is the only boy who won’t give her the time of day she requires of everyone.

Stiles is, in a word, unique. He’s hyper and he talks so fast sometimes Lydia has no idea if he’s even speaking English anymore. He talks about his mom and his dad and his best friend Scott whose asthma gets him picked on by some other boys. This always prompts Stiles to stick up for the other boy, even when it results in him being picked on as well. He never minds that, and goes right on with his bouncing-off-the-walls attitude, and Lydia loves it. What she doesn't love, is how none of that abundance of energy and goldfish attention-span is ever directed at her.

She doesn’t understand what it is that she does wrong, because she laughs at all his jokes, gave him more valentines than any of the other girls, and even invited him to her birthday party. Still, she never gets the attention she seeks from him.

Lydia sits next to Stiles in school and is always twirling her hair when she stares at him. He never needs any help on their worksheets like the boy who sits at her other side does. His name is Matt, and he stares at everything far more than necessary. Matt is friends with Isaac, whose smiles are like sunshine. Lydia almost likes them more than she likes Stiles’ lopsided grins.

He’s got said trademark grin on his face right now, and he’s babbling on to the new boy who was unfortunate enough to be placed behind Scott and diagonal from Stiles himself. She leans closer and listens in as Stiles rambles on without a pause for breath as he tells the new boy about how his dad is a cop and has a gun and everything! Disliking the view of the back of his head, Lydia nudges him with her arm and catches his attention for half a second, those pretty brown eyes of his searching her face for something unknown. She gives him her best smile and his grin widens only a fraction, before she’s faced with the back of his head once more as he continues talking to the boy behind them, whose name is Vernon as she catches from Stiles' unbroken stream of speech.

Lydia Martin is eight years old, and does not like being ignored.

 

She tells her grandmother as much when she visits the following weekend, and the old woman, hair silver but once as strawberry blonde as Lydia’s own, laughs her merry laugh and takes the third grader into her lap and rocks her gently.

“Lydia my sweet, the fickle hearts of boys and girls are hard to catch.”

“What’s fickle?”

“Constantly changing, darling.”

Lydia hums in acknowledgement, committing the new word to memory and giving her grandmother a sweet smile. She quite loves her grandmother; the old woman always smells of spices and has a coy smile on her face as if she has some great secret. Sometimes, Lydia’s quite sure she has a secret too, but she never says anything. Sometimes, Lydia thinks her grandmother knows, and never says anything either.

 

 

This is how she finds herself sitting cross-legged on her bedroom floor and staring adamantly at the class portrait of her third grade class. The children are arranged alphabetically, putting Jackson Whittemore – who Lydia is certain is the dumbest boy in the world – at the end, his best friend Danny stands next to Lydia, and Stiles is half a handful of children down in the next row, next to a chubby blonde girl who Lydia thinks is called Erica. Erica never stops staring at Stiles; she stares at him almost as much as Matt stares at everything in general.

Lydia runs her fingers over the digitalized face of the boy who won’t pay her any attention, and sighs, closing her eyes. She knows it’s silly to expect something for nothing, but she can’t help but be jealous whenever anyone gets the slightest bit of attention from Stiles Stilinski. Her grandmother told her this is what a crush is like. A crush, like she’ll squash him under her pretty dress shoes. She doesn’t like the word. She simply likes Stiles, and wishes he’d like her back. Except she’s a smart girl, she knows he’ll never give her the time of day, but still she refuses to believe that.

It’s funny, she’ll muse when she’s older; the girl with everyone’s attention only craved the attention of the single person who didn’t give her any. Over a hapless crush that started when he was seated next to her, the first day of school. She’ll reflect on that dazzling, crooked grin he gave her, shoving his hand in her space and announcing quite loudly that his name was Stiles, that it wasn’t  _really_ Stiles, that he liked that name better than his real name. She’ll remember the way she took his hand, staring at the loud boy in shock.

She’ll also remember sitting on her bedroom floor, thinking about her grandmother and her secrets and her strange manner of speech, and how no matter how much she liked Stiles – Stiles who was everybody’s friend, but not hers – would not like her back. Stiles who she dearly wished  _would_  like her back.

If there was one thing Lydia would remember until she was old and grey, it was the pounding in her ears that threatened to deafen her as she sat there on her bedroom floor, of blood pumping in her head, and the sudden buzz that ripped through her body, making her feel ready to vibrate out of her skin. She’d always remember being frozen in fear and confusion, as the pounding got louder and louder and the buzzing became more persistent, until all at once it stopped, over with as suddenly as it had started.

 

Lydia Martin is eight years old, and there are secrets in her family that she has not been let in on yet, and won’t be for years to come. She doesn’t tell anyone about the strange event that occurred in her bedroom one Friday afternoon. For the next two days she lets herself believe she imagined the whole thing, because things like that just didn’t happen.

Except maybe something  _did_  happen, because on Monday morning, instead of talking off Scott McCall’s ear, Stiles looks like he’s waiting for something, literally bouncing up and down with anticipation. Lydia wonders if they’re getting another new student; Stiles likes to make friends with the new kids. Only it’s not a new friend he’s waiting for – it’s her, if his reaction to seeing her is anything to go by. He almost flies out of his seat in his haste to turn and wave at her.

A blush threatens to creep up the girl’s face as she sits herself in her seat and Stiles is completely turned towards her, his attention focused solely on her. His behavior is strange. Not too different than usual – he is after all, very good at dedicating all of his (limited) attention on one thing and one thing alone. Only today, for the first time since deciding the boy worthy of her affections, Lydia Martin finds herself on the receiving end of attention she’s always craved. It's everything she's wanted; it's perfect.

Too perfect.


End file.
